PLEASE NOTE: FLOGGING MOLLY’S PERFORMANCE AT NOT SO SILENT NIGHT HAS BEEN CANCELLED
THE BAND HAS ANNOUNCED A SHOW ON MARCH 14 AT THE OGDEN THEATRE

In the early and mid 19th Century, coffin ships brought Ireland’s poor and disenfranchised to the shores of America. These ships had high mortality rates as they were crowded and disease ridden, with poor access to food and water and Sharks could often be seen following the ships because so many bodies were thrown overboard. The facts are that conditions on the ships were brought about from the ship owners focus on turning a greater profit. Famine and the demise of the family created the Irish Diaspora. This scattering of a people and it’s culture created a new working class that longed for the American Dream.

Perhaps an Irish American Punk band like Flogging Molly has never been more relevant than now as the Occupy Movement fills the nightly news coverage. The Occupy Movement was created by individuals who gathered together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, and a disdain for large corporations. The Occupy Movement believes that corporations place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality. Corporations have essentially stolen the American Dream away from the working class, and have directly contributed to the undue hardships that have befallen them.

Founded in Los Angeles in 1997, Flogging Molly infuses punk rock with Celtic instruments—violin, mandolin and the accordion—and they merge blues progressions with grinding guitars and traditional Irish music. The bands 2010 releaseSpeed of Darkness is filled with odes to the working man and battle cries against the elite establishment. This is apparent on the tracks “The Power’s Out.” (“The power’s out, there’s fuck all to see/The power’s out, like this economy/The power’s out, guess it’s par for the course/Unless you’re a bloodsucking leech CEO”), and “Rise Up” (“Rise up/Stand and be counted, stand and be counted/On that let’s agree/Rise up/Dig out the cancer, dig out the cancer of all human greed.”)

Wherever the music is, you'll find me with my camera, shooting on street corners, from barstools at clubs, from the side of the stage at theaters, and from photo pits in places like Red Rocks. Clicking away, trying to capture the emotive essence of music, and all those moments that we forget because of one too many Pabst Blue Ribbons.